A cluttered garage full of tools to find: tap each object in the picture, then give it its article.
1A compound takes the gender of its last part
2-er makes a tool masculine — but not every -er word
3Many tools in -e are feminine
Why this matters
A picture hunt instead of a deck: one lived-in home garage that doubles as a workshop, with 32 things to find in it — der Schraubstock on the workbench, die Zange on the pegboard, das Verlängerungskabel coiled on the floor. The prompt asks Wo ist der Rasenmäher? and you tap it in the picture. A tap on bare wall costs nothing; a tap on the wrong object tells you what you hit and you keep looking, and after three misses the right one is shown. Each find shows its label, coloured by its gender, then leaves a small tick in that colour, so you can see what you have already found. Once you have passed a run, the hunt turns harder: the prompt hides the article (Wo ist ___ Rasenmäher?), and after the find you choose der, die or das yourself. No object is asked twice in the same run.
Rule · 1 of 3
A compound takes the gender of its last part
Many tools are compounds, and the last part decides the article. Werkzeug + Kasten: der Kasten, so der Werkzeugkasten. Vorhänge + Schloss: das Schloss, so das Vorhängeschloss. Cover the front part and read only the last word.
der Gartenschlauch, Plural: Gartenschläuchegarden hose (der Schlauch)
das Verlängerungskabelextension cable (das Kabel)
Quick check
Taschenlampe liegt im Regal.
Watch out · 2 of 3
-er makes a tool masculine — but not every -er word
A machine or tool that does a job, named after its verb with -er, is masculine: der Rasenmäher (mähen), der Feuerlöscher (löschen), der Schraubenzieher (ziehen). An -er ending on its own proves nothing, though: die Leiter and das Fenster are in this garage too.
der Feuerlöscherfire extinguisher
die Leiter, Plural: -nladder
Quick check
Which article goes with Leiter?
Memory trick · 3 of 3
Many tools in -e are feminine
Listen for the final -e: die Säge, die Zange, die Schubkarre, die Luftpumpe. Most two-syllable nouns ending in -e are die, so when a tool ends in -e, try die first and say it aloud with every find.
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